The Void (set-up for a short story)
by certainsadness
Summary: Set-up for a short story involving the Dalek Time Controller who seeks to purge the universe of the very concept of time, using a mysterious anti-time device. The Doctor plays a role yet unknown in the Controller's plot to save the Dalek race by taking them out of existence.


**The Void**

Doctor Who: "Where am I? What is this place?"

Dalek Time Controller: "This is my ship."

Doctor Who: "Daleks! Since when does a single Dalek have its own ship? Who are you, where are you hiding?"

Dalek Time Controller: "Don't you recognize my voice, Doctor? I am the one who sees it all, the one in control."

Doctor Who: "Are you…? You cannot be. You should not be!"

Dalek Time Controller: "And yet here I am."

Doctor Who: "Where is here, actually?"

Dalek Time Controller: "We are in another plane of existence. Out of time. I brought you here because of something that will soon happen, will have happened, something that will soon never have been able to ever happen. It is your ending, Doctor."

Doctor Who: "You are not making any sense, fool!"

Dalek Time Controller: "Do you feel it yet, your sense of time slowly fading?"

Doctor Who: "Wha…how do you know this, how could you possibly know?"

Dalek Time Controller: "You are dying, Doctor. I can sense it throughout the timelines. I'd...like to help you."

Doctor Who: "What are you talking about! Dying, mh? You must be confusing me with someone else, dear fellow. I'm as fit as ever!"

Dalek Time Controller: "Time has run out. For both of us. I have deduced that the set of world lines in which the structure of all existence remains intact is rapidly narrowing. They all have one thing in common: The concept…_our_ concept of time must be purged from time itself."

Doctor Who: "What do you mean, 'our concept' 'purged from time'? This is not possible. You cannot erase a concept from time. I will not allow it!"

Dalek Time Controller: "It is the price you have to pay to be saved, Doctor, the sacrifice you must make. I have seen all your lives, I have been to the last universe and the next, I have conceived of all possible world lines, there is no other way. Doctor...you must eliminate time – from this plane and any other!"

Doctor Who: "Eliminate time? Eliminate time? You must have lost your mind, Dalek Time Controller. Too much exposure to the vortex, possibly. It made you quite mad, hasn't it? You must surely realize that you cannot survive this? That nobody can?"

Dalek Time Controller: "You are correct, my bond with time is too intricate to continue undamaged. Yet, it is a small sacrifice to make. Our plane of existence will remain intact. Life will...prevail."

Doctor Who: "You mean Dalek life?"

Dalek Time Controller: "All life."

Doctor Who: "You cannot destroy time without there being severe consequences! What do you mean 'all life', since when do you care about what is not Dalek?"

Dalek Time Controller: "Do not underestimate me, Doctor. The situation is far more complex than you can possibly imagine. For the Daleks to exist in the future, they must suffer the same fate as time itself, with me at the very centre."

Doctor Who: "You want to destroy the Daleks – your own race!"

Dalek Time Controller: "Exactly."

Doctor Who: "How can you possibly want that to happen? Quite mad! Wait, actually, that is not a bad idea…"

Dalek Time Controller: "By writing the Dalek race out of time, it is assured that they survive what will come, what inevitably must come."

Doctor Who: "What are you babbling on about? Tell me what you think will happen!"

Dalek Time Controller: "It will become clear to you soon. Have patience, Time Lord. And cherish your last moments...while there is still time..."

* * *

Dalek command: "Time controller! We have acquired information on the whereabouts of the Doctor, our greatest enemy! He must not interfere in our conquest! He is to be expunged!"

Dalek Time Controller: "No."

Dalek command: "But he is our greatest ene…"

Dalek Time Controller: "The Doctor must live in order to die, as the Daleks must die in order to live."

Dalek command: "This is treachery! Survival of the Dalek race must be assured! The Doctor must be stopped! Explain!"

Dalek Time Controller: "Am I not seeing all of time and space, and even beyond?"

Dalek command: "Yes…"

Dalek Time Controller: "Have I not deduced the role the Doctor will have to play – will had been playing in my plan?"

Dalek command: "Yes…"

Dalek Time Controller: "It is not relevant whether the Doctor interferes or even thwarts your invasion of this system, I see it clearly. But under no circumstances can he be allowed to discover the anti-time device. You should be able to conceal it from him with little effort. This incarnation of the Time Lord has not encountered the universe of anti-time yet, he is not aware of what will come of this device. He alone is the key to assuring that the concept of time is eliminated from this universe. And to escape The Great Void, we must follow…only to emerge again.

Dalek command: "We…understand."


End file.
